The Horse Changer Read Free

Dolabella’s statues. I was also fairly sure she would never get my toga unwound, but she informed me she was married to a senator; she knew well the intimate secrets of that dowdy costume. When I found myself with my toga around my feet, it was too late to resist, and besides I had an erection Priapus himself might have envied. We finished matters where we stood and, as she walked away without so much as a kiss goodbye, Dolabella began clapping his hands. After that, his harem joined the applause, and then the whole room. At long last no virgins remained under Dolabella’s roof.
    Now I must confess the full truth, for I have promised myself to hold nothing back in my history: I found the experience so exhilarating I tried to lose my innocence thrice more before the dawn and this time with any female who would have me. But some things we can only lose once. Eh, Judah?

    It was summer, the season for war, but the wars were finished. Even restless Caesar was at his ease, dividing his time between the couches of Servilia Caepionis, Queen Cleopatra of Egypt, who was then visiting Rome with her consort brother, and Caesar’s patient, long-suffering wife Calpurnia.
    At the second of Dolabella’s parties I went dressed more appropriately in a fine tunic cut in the Greek style. It was trimmed with gold thread and bore a line of gentrified purple to distinguish me from the pretty street boys Dolabella set about the room. It was a handsome tunic, I can tell you, so much so that I was hardly through the front gate before a sweet songbird knelt before me and proceeded to introduce me to the Egyptian arts. When she had properly fixed my attention, she pulled my tunic over my head and walked away with it. I never did see that tunic again or the girl either, for that matter.

    Of course, I did not only attend Dolabella’s orgies. I also spent several nights losing at dice. During the daytime I gambled on chariot races at the Circus Maximus and impromptu wrestling matches at the baths. A perfect artist with a horse, I knew the best team in a race at a glance. I could read a man’s fighting talents nearly as well. I soon learned, however, that the finest horses in the world cannot win a race if their driver holds them back and no one is victorious in a wrestling match if there is more money to be made by losing it. Easy money? There is no such thing in Rome.
    I was soon feasting on scraps and caging drinks at taverns where a man could get knifed for the sake of his fine tunic, which I had fortunately already lost. One night a young beauty persuaded me to borrow a sum of money on her behalf. All I had to do was sign my name and the matter was settled. If I didn’t, she was headed to a brothel to pay off the debt her father owed. There is no fool to compare with a nineteen-year-old boy, especially where a presumably innocent young beauty is concerned. With her cupid-bow lips and limpid eyes, how could I possibly allow that sweet creature to become public fodder? It was unthinkable. I signed and got a sweet kiss on my cheek for a thank you.
    The debt collector came to the house early next morning for the money. I was still sleeping it off and didn’t recall signing anything. Not at first, at any rate. Then I saw my name, my province, my father’s name, and where I lived in Rome. Yes, it seemed I had agreed to pay something. But such a figure as that? I couldn’t believe it. The patriarch of the family protecting me bought me out of my debt without a word to my father, who would have ordered me back to Tuscany at once. It was a handsome sum, I can tell you, and I promised to pay it back as soon as I could, though in fact it took some years before I possessed an amount sufficient to close the account. By then I had to repay the heirs. Civil wars are especially cruel in that respect.
    By chance I saw that same girl some nights later at a different tavern and learned from my companion in debauchery she was the finest fellatrix in all of